For most of the day we were sailing with poled Genoa and main today – going quite quickly – managing 174NM in the last 24 hours. However, at about 6:00pm, it all came to a screeching halt with suddenly no wind…

This was expected and had been the subject of quite a debate on Toodle-oo!. Our course was being interrupted by some weather – our nice downwind was disappearing to our starboard and being replaced by headwinds from the port. I had developed a plan that would see us going at 90 degrees to our destination for a few hours – to get through the front and then we’d have plain sailing the rest of the way in. When I showed this to Laurie she baulked! Going at 90 degrees to our destination is not something she has ever been a fan of – so we developed an alternate strategy – which ends up most likely being the better strategy, keeping us away from potentially heavy weather for the last part of the trip. Unfortunately, it means that we’ll be motoring for probably 24 hours or so now before we get a light wind on our port side to work with – but after that, hopefully plain sailing into Dingle.

So the wind died this evening and now we’re motoring with the main up to reduce our roll, but slatting back and forth being very annoying. I decided to try to stabilize even further with the small jib – so pulled it out a little. However when I went to furl it a bit, it wouldn’t. The furling line was well and truly tangled and after about 30 minutes at the bow trying to get it untangled, I gave up and we decided to drop the sail. Once down I was able to get the furler untangled and we re-hoist the sail – though decided against it’s deployment! New furling line required…

Not much sleep today with the rolly seas, but all is good aboard – though we could really use some recent decent movies to watch! I’m down to watching Turner and Hooch and The Hobbit!